Author: Doug Groves

dougplanet.com is his personal blog, which is withering on the vine. If you poke around it, you’ll find out that he’s an animator and broadcast designer by trade, usually pushing pixels in either After Effects or Lightwave 3D. If he absolutely had to pick a favourite all time writer, it would be Harlan Ellison more days than any other. If you don’t know who Ellison is, then Doug weeps for you. Doug also likes long walks on the beach, mainly to collect improperly discarded medical waste for an undisclosed project of epic proportions.

Bell announces HTC Desire Z as coming soon

October 14, 2010October 19, 2010 Doug Groves Bell, Desire Z, HTC, HTC Desire Z, HTC Sense, htcsense.com, press release, QWERTY slider, Sense1 Comment

Although some internal documents leaked to the web a few days back, Bell has now made the launch of the HTC Desire Z official. It will be the exclusive carrier of HTC’s QWERTY keyboard Android pone. The Desire Z, powered by Android 2.2 (Froyo) and an 800MHz Qualcomm chip, will be the first in Canada to offer 14.4 megabits per second downloads. To promote the launch, Bell is running a contest to win a Desire Z, which you can enter here. The Desire Z will also be the first phone…

Return of the SwagBag Giveaway – UPDATED

October 13, 2010October 19, 2010 Doug Groves Caanan Grall, Camilla derrico, Fan Expo 2010, Max Overacts, Nick Thornborrow, Robert Kirkman, Snakors Pizza, swag bag, Swag Bag 2010, Tanpopo, The Anthology Project, The Chubby Bounty Hunter, The Walking Dead, Uyugomiak14 Comments

Reviews are in and interviews have been posted, which means our Fan Expo 2010 coverage has wrapped. If you didn’t get a chance to go this year, see our full Fan Expo 2010 coverage for interviews, reviews and more. It’s like going to the convention without a four hour lineup and the fire marshal locking you out! Best of all, do it from home in your underwear. The one thing you DON’T get out of virtual conventions is swag. Lots of wonderful swag. We can fix that too!

Fable III “Revolution” trailer launches

October 13, 2010October 15, 2010 Doug Groves Fable III, josh atkins, Lionhead Studios, trailer0 comment

In less than two weeks (or Oct 26), Fable III launches for the Xbox 360, continuing the adventures in Albion. This time, your character plays a revolutionary who becomes leader, and the decisions you make along the way. In our in-depth interview with Lionhead creative director Josh Atkins, he mentions that one of the goals of the game was to have the players actually put down the controls to consider their moral decisions. The trailer itself eschews gameplay to focus on the atmosphere of the game. The combination of music…

Microsoft rebrands XNA Creators Club as App Hub

October 12, 2010October 13, 2010 Doug Groves App Hub, game development, MSDN, PC gaming, Windows Phone 7, WP7, Xbox 360, XNA, XNA Creators Club4 Comments

When Microsoft first launched the XNA toolset, it was aimed at making cross-platform game development easier for independent game designers, and providing a framework to target them towards not only various Windows operating systems, but the Zune and Xbox 360 as well. To target the Xbox 360, one had to pay an annual membership of $99, which made you a part of the community to submit games for sale directly on the console. It’s actually a pretty innovative approach to letting the individual developer a way into console games creation,…

AMC’s The Walking Dead gets a Mini-doc

October 12, 2010October 12, 2010 Doug Groves AMC, Documentary, Frank Darabont, Robert Kirkman, The Walking Dead, video2 Comments

It’s no secret that the RGB Filter bullpen has more than its share of zombie fans, which explains why this isn’t the first time we’ve posted about The Walking Dead TV series coming out from AMC, which kicks off on All Hallow’s Eve. As part of the build-up, AMC has released a new 18 minute documentary on the making of the show, talking with the producers, actors, and writer of the the comic, Robert Kirkman.

Talking Rock Band 3 at the PS3 Holiday Event

October 12, 2010October 14, 2010 Doug Groves Cam Curran, DLC, event, harmonix, interview, Microsoft, MIDI, MTV Games, Nintendo, Playstation, pro guitar, pro mode, PS3, Rock Band 3, Sony, Wii, Xbox 3601 Comment

MTV Games and Harmonix were showing off Rock Band 3 at the recent PS3 Holiday Event held at the Sony Centre for the Performing Arts, and we talked with Cam Curran of MTV Games to find out what we could expect from the game when it’s released Oct 26th.

LG Windows Phone 7 – Optimus 7 and Quantum Hands On Video

October 12, 2010October 15, 2010 Doug Groves Bell, hands-on, LAYAR, LG, Microsoft, Optimus 8, Optimus Quantum, Panorama Shot, Scan Search, ScanSearch, slider, sneak peek, Telus, video, Windows Phone 7, WP7, Xbox Live7 Comments

At a recent LG event, we got some hands on time with LG’s two Windows Phone 7 devices headed towards the Canadian market, the LG Optimus 7 slate style phone on Telus, and the LG Optimus Quantum QWERTY slider on Bell. Both phones sport 16GB of RAM and 1GHz processors, with the real differentiator between the two being the choice of keyboard or not. The Optimus 7 has a 3.8″ screen, while the keyboard packing Optimus Quantum has a slightly smaller 3.5″ screen. During our demonstration, Frank Lee of LG…

Playstation interview with Sony Canada’s Matt Levitan

October 8, 2010October 13, 2010 Doug Groves 3D, Gran Turismo 5, Hummingbird Centre, interview, Matt Levitan, Metal Gear Solid Rising, PS3, PS3 Move, Resident Evil 6, SCEC, Sony, Sony Centre, Toronto, Tron Evolution1 Comment

This past week, Sony held a public Holiday preview event at the Hummingbird Sony Centre for the Performing Arts, showcasing not only a number of games aiming for the holiday season and beyond, but the PS3 Move and 3D in action. While there, the biggest lineup was probably for Gran Turismo 5, which had a lot of people waiting to get their hands on it. We got a chance to talk with Matt Levitan, Director of Marketing / Public Relations for Sony Computer Entertainment Canada, about how the Move is…

Stupid Gaming Forum Arguments 001

October 8, 2010July 30, 2014 Doug Groves editorial comic, Kinect, Microsoft, PS3, PS3 Move, rgbcomic, Sony, Xbox 3601 Comment

If you’ve spent even a little bit of time reading gaming forums or comments over the past couple of months, you’re probably familiar with the PS3 Move vs Xbox Kinect flame wars that have broken out…

Rogers testing LTE wireless in Ottawa

October 7, 2010October 9, 2010 Doug Groves LTE, Ottawa, press release, Rogers, trial, WiMax1 Comment

Rogers has started running a ‘comprehensive’ trial of it’s LTE wireless network in the nations capital, which could bring download speeds of up to 150 Mbps to mobile devices. LTE is a 4G technology meant to replace existing 3G networks. Both LTE and WiMax, which around for a quite some time now, are just starting to see adoption as standards. At one point there was speculation that LTE would be in Vancouver by the 2010 Olympics, but that never really panned out.

Best Worst Movie screening tomorrow

October 6, 2010October 7, 2010 Doug Groves Best Worst Movie, canada, double bill, Michael Stephenson, screening, theatre, Troll 21 Comment

Last year, Michael Paul Stephenson released Best Worst Movie, a documentary about the making of 1990’s Troll 2, and the cult following it’s garnered over the years. If you’re one of the (un?)fortunate souls who rented Troll 2 back in the day, you know it sits in that hallowed realm of movies so bad it’s good, and is probably best experienced with a crowd of like-minded individuals who can handle a good portion of cheese in their cinematic diet. I’ll have to admit that I never made it all the…

Toshiba Satellite A660 3D laptop review

October 4, 2010October 11, 2010 Doug Groves 3D Vision, A660-042, BD, blu ray, Blu Ray 3D, BluRay, Core i7, Intel, Laptop, notebook, Nvidia 3D Vision, PC gaming, review, Toshiba, Toshiba A660, Toshiba A660-042, Toshiba Satellite4 Comments

When a review unit of the Toshiba A660-042 arrived at the studio, I wasn’t sure what to make of it. The A660-042 is Toshiba’s high end Satellite laptop, and comes complete with NVidia’s 3D Vision technology. I had just come off trying Sony’s 3D in the PS3 and remained unimpressed with 3D in the home. So my expectations were set pretty low. I may have been wrong, but I was also surprised at how much more than a ‘3D laptop’ this was…